The Fix Is Something Something

I don't really care for or about basketball, but when the Lakers and the Celtics happen to magically play each other in the NBA Championship just after a referee betting scandal, the corruption is just too giddy and blatant to ignore. You've got to admit how ballsy it is for David Stern to go ahead and offer up some corruption as proof that there is no corruption. It'd be like Bud Selig allocating all the good players on bad teams to the Yankees and Red Sox free of charge in order to distract from the steroids scandal. I guess it could be just an interesting coincidence, and the fixing-mechanism known as the Salary Cap has been leading to something like this for a long time anyway, but it smells. The Celtics were a laughing stock not that long ago, and as I recall, Ray Allen was on the downturn of a stunningly uninteresting career at about that same time. Now, all of a sudden he's gone from being the poor-man's Reggie Miller to being the third prong in a three-pronged attack that has taken the NBA by storm. I mean, what the fuck, man? Did the royalty checks from He Got Game quit coming in?

In the interest of a fairytale storyline appearing and a resurgence of interest and goodwill shooting towards the eyes of the NBA, I guess it will have to go seven games. I guess Kobe Bryant will pass the ball to some white guy who makes a game-winning shot when the Lakers look like they have their backs against the wall. (Note: if the Lakers don't have white guys, we're counting Pau Gasol. I'm obviously not going to spend any time looking at their roster or whatever a real commenter would do. Incidently, I really like Pau Gasol. I've only met him once, but he was reading The Power of Now that once. Seems all right.) I guess one of Boston's big three, maybe even Ray Allen, will foul out in the deciding game. Overtime, dramatic three-pointers, close-ups of Kevin Garnett's sweaty forehead. That's what we have to look forward to, and it'd be thrilling if it were less predictable.

Equally predictable has been the dismantling of the never-proud Colorado Rockies empire. On one hand, you can't be too eager to dismiss the whole thing this year because injuries are a convenient and ready excuse for their shitty performance, at least in Philadelphia and Chicago. Pitching has been a completely predictable disaster, and the thing that annoys me most is that Clint Hurdle and Dan O'Dowd seem just as unsurprised as me that all the retreads they're trotting out to the mound are self-destructing at rates that would make even the most diligent suicide bomber uneasy. Glendon Rusch? Give me a fucking break. There's some reason to think that the triumphant return of Troy Tulowitzki and Matt Holliday will mean something, but if a god damn 8 run lead isn't safe, as it wasn't against Chicago on Friday, then who cares? The Rockies had a pretty good chance to put together something akin to the Twins of the early part of this decade or the current Indians and compete year in and year out for half a decade or more. Instead, they opted for sentimentality like the '93 Phillies and '05 White Sox and you reep what you sow, don't you? The best bet is that inflated expectations from last year mean that Hurdle and O'Dowd are on the chopping block, but that kind of optimism is dangerously neglegent of the power of the Good Ol' Boys Club. More likely; another 12 years of mediocrity before a big fluke season. Make no mistake, some guys are about to get traded and the return on Holliday, Atkins or whoever had damn well better be something more than Trader Dan got for Larry Walker. Got help us.

As a newly minted MLS season ticket holder, I think I have some obligation to comment on the goings-on in Commerce City, but I've been watching so gleefully at the dismantling of Rijkaard's men that I have to plead distraction on the soccer front. Zambrotta's the latest to go, and good riddance to the guy who seems like a swell chap for an Italian footballer but was consistently bad at, you know, his job. Edmilson's off to Villareal, and we can all just hope that Yaya Toure has the decency to take him out at the knees the first time the teams square off next year.

The Rapids have been a lot of fun to watch, in spite of their complete unwillingness to finish. Omar Cummings can only score when the ball's put right to his feet and he's in front of an open net, and then he only scores if he can somehow be convinced that in that situation it is totally unnecessary to dribble. Weird, slightly off-kilter Scotsman Tom McManus seems like he might get things going in a little while, but the weird loyalty to Cummings is going to have to stop sometime. Yes, be very afraid. 12 points from 9 matches is good for 2nd place in this ridiculous league, so any predictions or analysis are an exercise in intellectual masturbation that even I'm not willing to delve into.

Now, let's just wait to see who wins Euro 2008, and start shopping for padding and maybe bullet-proof vests ahead of the DNC Convention in August. I think it's better not to be too hasty on these things, but if you're not prepared, you're liable to be swallowed up by the crowd. Let's just say that if Germany, Holland or Italy wins the Euro, that taken in combination with the Celtics-Lakers nonsense is a harbinger of evil and it'd be best for everyone involved just to get out of this city when Barack and Hillary swing in to settle their bloodfight. You don't want to be involved, even as a witness. Believe me.

Hubris

You would think the English, of all people, would have taken the principle lesson from Beowulf and that is, of course, to avoid hubris. But they thought it was a done deal after Israel's incredible win over Russia last weekend that they would qualify for EURO 2008 and the discussion turned immediately to "Wow, Steve McLaren is vindicated" and "Ohhh, will Beckham be selected for the tournament?" and nobody considered that, without Terry, Owen, Rooney or humility, the team was surely doomed.

Skybet had the English side as 1/10 favorites to win today, with a 4-1 win given equal odds as a 2-2 draw. Hubris, and I knew I should've taken those bets but we live in a puritan society where betting online is akin to child porn as far as ethics and so on are concerned. Otherwise, I'd be a rich man because I really thought England were dooming themselves to humiliation by being so sure of themselves.

And, they faced massive humiliation. Not only losing, but losing to Croatia. Going down 2-0 in 14 minutes. Coming back to tie, and the thrill and relief that comes with it. Having that utterly devastated just 12 minutes later. Just, completely blowing it. At Wembley. Beckham stuck on 99 caps. I mean. The destruction and embarrassment is almost too much. The English not qualifying for EURO is one thing, but the English not qualifying is such thorough, horrific style. I mean, my God.

Now. There will be some clamoring for the placement of foreign player limits in the Premiership. Or, I guess, there has already been a lot of clamoring and now the clamorers will likely win. This will not raise the level of the English national team, of course, but it is natural and easy to blame their terrible performance on the big bad Africans and South Americans and Eastern Europeans instead of on their own selves. The truth is, not enough English players are good enough to play for the Big Four and probably not even the top 6 or 7 clubs in the Premiership. This is not a flaw of the league, of course, but rather a flaw of England. All a foreign player limit does is lower the quality of football being played in the sport's mother country, by filling the clubs with lesser players who happen to have the right kind of parents. In fact, the top level English players are exceptionally lucky that they have a passage into such a great league simply because of their nationality. Would Frank Lampard really start for Chelsea if he had been born French, or Peruvian or something? I sincerely doubt it.

A bigger idea is to try and send more English players to the leagues on the continent. The concept that a National Team is irrevocably tied to the Domestic Leagues of its country is laughable in today's football. Even Italian players are leaving Italy at this point, and the English should follow.

In a world where a foreigner limit is imposed in England, The Big Four would have to field line-ups with the likes of Gareth Barry, Paul Robinson, James Milner, Dave Kitson. I mean, there's this weird idea that the level of the Premiership is static no matter who plays there. This is just basically, obviously not true. Imposing the limit would not make the English national team any better, but it would definitely make Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester United, and Liverpool worse.